A Statement Addressing Inaccuracies in Print and Media About Transfield #19BoS

The following is a selection of statements made by Transfield and repeated in print and media.

Transfield Holdings has “nothing to do with the running of mandatory detention facilities”

Transfield Holdings is a substantial shareholder in Transfield Services Ltd, which has been running mandatory detention facilities under contracts worth over $2 billion. Suggesting that Transfield Holdings would be involved in the “running of” the internment camps is like suggesting that the Prime Minister’s office is stapling together the press releases in the Department of Immigration and Border Protection.

The Biennale Board says it’s caught between ideology and principle.

We honestly do not understand what this could possibly mean. Anyone?

a space where politics and ideology are colliding

Still not making sense.

Ps, Luca Belgiorno-Nettis is the Chair of the Biennale Board, so can issue press statements for them as he does for Transfield.

apart from the fact that we’re not wanting to necessarily disassociate with them [Transfield] because they’re doing nothing wrong anyway in our view. But we’re taking all this flak unwarranted.

Er, “apart from that fact” but “unwarranted” is an obfuscatory collocation.

I am not representative of the board, my brother isn’t representative of the board. We have a minority shareholding; we hardly speak to them.

Luca Belgiorno-Nettis is not a representative of the Transfield Services Board. This is true. He does however have a representative on the Board.

Before we get to that, here are some other things to bear in mind.

Luca and Guido Belgiorno-Nettis have a minority shareholding because it is less than 50% plus one of the total number of shares. There are no majority shareholders in Transfield Services, as is the case in most entities that trade on stock exchanges.

Transfield Holdings are however over double the figure according to which the Australian Stock Exchange (ASX) defines a “substantial shareholder.” A substantial shareholding requires disclosure under the terms of the ASX. This is why the names of both Luca and Guido Belgiorno-Nettis appear in the Sept 2013 Annual Report to shareholders of Transfield Services Ltd. They both are registered as attending meetings of the TSE Board in this capacity, and having received payments while Transfield Services was expanding its role in mandatory detention contracts during 2012-13.

In the Notes to Consolidated Financial Statements, it reads:

They [Luca & Guido Belgiorno-Nettis) are also joint Executive Directors of Transfield Holdings Pty Limited. This means they each indirectly control 56,049,887 (2012: 57,849,887) shares in Transfield Services Limited.

For those who keep insisting that these are not the same company, we point out once again the connective phrase “this means.” They own those shares in their capacity as joint Executive Directors of Transfield Holdings.

On page 15, in fine print in the footnote of the Annual Report to shareholders, is the following information:

Meet Mr McKelvie, Transfield Holdings’ nominee director on the Transfield Services Board, whom we are given to understand that Luca & Guido Belgiorno-Nettis “hardly speak” to but who, nevertheless, is their nominated director on the Board of Transfield Services.

According to the 2013 Annual Report of Transfield Holdings Luca and Guido control 98% of the shares. They both directly profit from the detention of asylum seekers. This from a company built by refugees on the goodwill our country has given to refugees.